Smoking trait of the petteroid, can it be reduced/eliminated?

[Doug]

This is the firts time I've heard Joel Koch's name connected with Petteroids hmm....

I wonder how many of these he has and if there are problems with others he's sold.

Does anyone else have any information on Mini Petters from Ashmawegh and from whom they were imported?

If you don't mind an uncomfortable question when did you buy this from him and what idid he charge for it?

What help or advice did he offer reagrding problems you had?

Doug

[mobile_bob]

gotta chime in here

there is not a single importer of indian engines that have not had quality issues of some sort, and to point a finger at a particular importer is patently unfair to say the least.

There are importers who have sold engines and have never lifted a finger to resolve problems, and then there are a few who have spent 10's of thousands of dollars to resolve numerous issues.

i know Joel Koch and he is one of the latter, in that he has always to my knowlege gone the extra mile to try and resolve issues with engine's he has sold, i have personally bought far more engines from him and his partner than i suspect anyone here has from any importer,,, bar none!

to point a crooked finger at Joel for not backing up his products is to me another example of small sampling and in some cases small thinking on the buyers part.. we all know mercedes builds a good engine and there are those that could find fault with them as well... sort of like some folks could wreck a crowbar in a sandbox.

at this point in the game, where the epa has made it nearly impossible to legally import these engines, what purpose does it serve to take jabs at any importer?? and i know all importers have their share of bad stories, bad customers, and bad suppliers,, if they tell you otherwise they are simply full of crap.

it is common knowlege that ashwemeh is a problem child, so what does it matter who has sold them, and who owns them?? there are not going to be more of them imported!

the minipetters have all had their issues no matter who the builder was, or who imported them.
but for the dollars spent, they on their worst day are still a bargain. i defy anyone here to tell me that he can come up with an alternative for the money.. sure there are issues, but that is what this board and others are about,, that is to resolve issues,, not just complain and point fingers,, right?

when it comes to priceing,,, frankly it is no ones business what the margin of profit was on the sale!

everyone wants the lowest price they can get,, and then once getting this price if anything isnt perfect we jump up and bitch... that doesnt seem right to me.

i have stated it once, twice or a few more times..

the indian engines are a fantastic bargain for the money,, no matter what the issues are.
no one here is going to make up patterns, get them casted into iron, machined and assembled for 10 times the price,, no one!

in 1973 lamborgini first exported the countach, not one single one of them arrived at port here in the states that ran!!! no one of them!!!
buyers paid a couple hundred grand for a car that had to be transported to one shop in california to be completely overhauled and retrofitted to meet epa standards ... not one of those buyers bitched... do you know why?
there was no other option,,, just like with the indian petters and listers,,, there is no other option for anywhere near the money..

perhaps these engines should not be purchased by those that have no clue what to expect or how to make them work to the level of their expectation.

i suspect that there are those that complain the most about problems with these engines that should have just bucked up and bought a kubota or a honda.

bob g

[Doug]

Slow down Bob....

I never said anything bad about Joel.

I didn't know he imported them untill now.

I am currious as to what help and fixes he was able to offer. For example The dutch guy said he got spares from Anand for the Petteroid. This is interesting because it may mean Joel had no parts or his parts were bad or a lot of things.

I would like to know the full story.

Joel:
If I have offended you I am sorry that wasn't my intent. You haven't posted for along time, please give us your perspective on the mini Petter.
I don't think its unreasonable to ask the questions I do. How else do get to know what to expect?

I've pointed a finger at Willy and Crosby and no one said much and asked much the same questions. I asked if anyone had verified the date that Mike invented the Pully. Now I cast some light on Joel and his mini Petters why not? How does one know a good Petter from bad if we can't openly discuss makers and importers and the problems.

Doug

[mobile_bob]

Doug:

i guess it all comes down to a matter of perspective and expectations.

if one expects a swiss watch he is going to be very upset with any indian offerings

if however he expects to have to do some work,, and by that i mean perhaps more work than he is capable of , he must expect to have to pay
to have some of the parts brought up to spec,

now then,, what is spec?,,,, spec is that which will make the engine run reliably, not to aerospace standards.

my point is simply,, there are no perfect engines comeing from anywhere on the planet,, none,, they all have issues of some sort or another
and yes the indian engines have a few more issues than a cat or a kubota or a honda,,, but at a fraction of the price initially.

Doug, we all know you cannot make all the people happy all the time, there will always be problem machines, and problem people,,,
the real problem comes in when the two get together.

thankfully this marriage of bad engine and bad customer is more of a rare event,,, i suspect for every bad engine there are many others (dozens if not hundreds) that just keep thunking along makeing power,

the problem expands though when because of the nature of this forum and human nature,,, all the problems get the headlines,, and all the good runners no one much hears about them..

you know how it goes,,, one satisfied customer tells maybe 7 people,, one pain in the ass customer tells everyone who will listen forever and ever.

i am just not sure it is fair now especially with the epa crackdown, (if it was ever fair) to beat up on an importer whoever he is, unless there is real evidence that he did not try to make it right... bearing in mind some folks you cannot ever satisfy even if you gave them all their money back and a free cheeseburger.

i am still very sour on this whole epa thing, and am becomeing more convinced that an era has passed,, we just don't want to admit it yet.
as for the importers,, i know there are a few working tirelessly to keep the engines coming,,, and if we beat up on them,,, they are just going to take their ball
and go home... i know i would.

bob g

[Doug]

Bob This has nothing to do with the EPA or the Joels character.

Dutchman doesn't even complain....

I am trying to find patterns and paper trails of what brands, dates and venders had problems.

I have hundreds of photos on file now of castings and parts. And I've started to build a data base of serial numbers and venders.

Why?
Because I thinks it important to know what went right in the past and what went wrong. Someday I'll post all my files and I hope it will help people decide if engine "X" is realy better than engine "Y" and people will be able to reward the realy good venders with their buisness and avoid the dogs.

I have one character flaw, I am not as impartial as I need to be for this but I'm not beating up on Joel I just want to know the history of his Petters.

I have no idea where the winds will blow with regards to future engines. But those with us now might be all there ever is so lets get back on track and find the problems and look for patterns.

mkdutchman:
Are you unhappy with the Petter or the service you received?
I gather after you got you MP running your quite happy with it you just don't need it.
Bob seems to think you may have issues.
Is there more going on here than we have been told?

Doug

[mobile_bob]

Doug:

MKDutch did not allude to enough info for me to determine if he has problems now or not, or whether or not he was treated fairly,, based on what he posted, i just don't know.. however i do know alot of folks that have ordered and received engines from Joel and have been treated very fairly both at time of sale and after sale support.
i know that if these engines were still widely available and unrestricted Joel would be the go to guy for me.

as for your database, perhaps you should not only compile the issues or problems, but also compile a list of repairs and fixes to correct these issues

now a database such as that would be very useful.

bob g

[mkdutchman]

Easy Bob
we need light, not heat. No one is beating up on anyone, and EPA or no EPA, going sour won't help matters in the least.

This is the firts time I've heard Joel Koch's name connected with Petteroids hmm....

I wonder how many of these he has and if there are problems with others he's sold.

Does anyone else have any information on Mini Petters from Ashmawegh and from whom they were imported?

If you don't mind an uncomfortable question when did you buy this from him and what idid he charge for it?

What help or advice did he offer reagrding problems you had?

Doug

There's a long story with this thing, I'll try to start at the beginning...........
There are two of us here, edutchie and mkdutchman. edutchie owns the small home based business, (powered by first the petteroid then the listeroid) I am his employee, technician, repairman, mechanic, etc. We are offgrid, and need a source of power through the day, this was usually done with a solar panel/battery/inverter setup, supplemented by a Honda motor with an alternator. We also need compressed air, and that was done with a separate propane powered Honda motor via a line shaft.
The whole setup worked, but the fuel costs were sorta expensive, so edutchie started looking around a bit, talked with utterpower, got George's CD, dug through the forum, etc. This was approximately a year ago. After awhile he settled on the Petteroid as the motor of choice, and got one from Joel Kuch for around $400, plus approx $2-300  for shipping if I remember correctly, in March or April of last year. Once it arrived we did a complete and total teardown, and found the usual sand in the crankcase, scratched crankpin journals, etc, but all in all not too bad. Upon contacting Joel he sent us new crankpin bushings, we liked the service we got from Joel, he was very helpful and I would recommend him to anybody. As documented earlier in this thread upon reassembly the thing smoked like a chimney, ran really rough, like a hit and miss engine, and did its best to take off through the concrete whenever our backs were turned. We even got one of the local diesel repairman to look at it, he fiddled with it awhile, left it running, and then made the mistake of walking out around the back to look at the exhaust stack, I can still hear that motor taking off and screaming like a dragster..... and see  that guy hauling into the powerhouse and slapping his hand over the air intake................he must really have some guts

Joel did his best to help us out but neither of us could really get to the bottom of the problems, we decided the timing was off (according to the instruction manual it was way off) and got another camshaft, I know for a fact that Joel took it out of an engine he had sitting there. It hardly made a difference at all, and he didn't really know what more to do, so we got a hold of Jayent Tank from Ashmawegh, who sent us a camshaft, gasket set, and injector, it didn't make a difference at all. We'd noticed that the injector pump missed when the rack was pulled in, but no one really seemed to think that was a problem, except fattywagonman. Upon contacting utterpower, he referred us to Joel, saying he doesn't sell Petteroids. It's not hard to figure out why!! I can't blame anybody for not wanting to sell them.

We had a dialogue going with Ashmawegh for awhile by then, but he was not helpful at all, he didn't want to sell us more parts. He kept making lots of helpful noises and promises of getting me prices, parts, solutions, but we never saw any more, other than lots of "You should get a containerload of my engine before EPA ban". After I told him I want to fix what I have first and then go from there, he stopped returning my emails. What we wanted was an injector pump, but being unable to get it the whole petteroid thing was dead in the water, and so we let it sit till we figured out what to do about it.............which we finally did by getting a Metro 6/1 from Sam Crosby. That engine now runs our entire power system, compressor, alternator, and all..........

Then about a month ago edutchie contacted Power Anand and asked them if they have an injector pump for a petteroid type motor...........they said sure no problem. So   about 2 weeks later a pump shows up, I could scarcely believe it. And lo and behold upon installation the engine even runs half decent, but it did try it's runaway trick, some fiddling with the governor took care of that, and lo and behold we now have a 3.5HP Petteroid on our hands that works, still smokes a bit, but that's thinning down the longer we run it so I think we're alright on that.........the only thing is we don't need it now that we have a Metro.............Petteroid anyone? We'll let it go for $850 plus cooling tank, parts, basically everything minus the alternator.............

As far as our dealings with the different people............

I feel Joel Kuch is alright, he helped us all he could, and even went an extra mile or two for us.......

Ashmawegh just plain stinks, what is worse than someone who makes all kinds of helpful promises and noises and then refuses to deliver?

Utterpower is alright for the most part, he gave us names, phone numbers, email addresses and so on, he can be very helpful if he wants to be............

Power Anand really deserves a thumbs up for stepping in like they did, if it weren't for them that petter would still be silent, and if in the future I have a means of throwing business their way I'll do so................

Here's a picture of the powerhouse..........

[Doug]

Fantastic!

We have a success story.
We know what happened.
What was done to rtesolve the issue.
We have a vender who stood up and tried to solve the problem.
We have parts, and a solution.

Do you mind providing the serial number and hours clocked. hopefuly this new owner will keep us up too date on how the engine holds up.

Doug

Good on you Joel Koch, for doing all you could to help!
And good on you too Atul, for being able to suply good parts.

[mkdutchman]

What was done to rtesolve the issue.
We have a vender who stood up and tried to solve the problem.
We have parts, and a solution.

Do you mind providing the serial number and hours clocked. hopefuly this new owner will keep us up too date on how the engine holds up.

Doug

serial# is 13
Funny I never noticed that serial number before, I wonder if this is one of the first engines Ashmawegh made. It would sure seem that way

I'm convinced both the runaway and rough running, smoky problem lay in the injector pump, correct me if the following speculation is flawed

Upon cranking the engine slowly by hand with the injector pulled the pump started missing every other shot when the rack was approx three quarters pulled in. This is shown in one of the video links I posted earlier, for convenience I'll post it again here

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3016170886905787342

Now, when the motor was not under load the rack was below the point at which the injector would squirt every other time, in effect giving it twice the fuel every other shot and skipping the shots in between. The engine would be dealing with twice the fuel, therefore the smoke, also each individual combustion stroke would be louder/harder therefore the rough running

Under load the motor would stall, so the rack would go out, move past the "every other time" point and then suddenly start firing each time, causing the motor to take off. The reason the governor wouldn't do its thing was because we had to adjust the rack way out so the motor would run under load without stalling...........

Thoughts?

[Doug]

I don't know.....

I'd like to talk to Hotater about this. He has some mini Petteroids and has stripped them to repair a run away. I never found out what exactly was the trouble.

The big Petter I have leads me to think that something in the cam and govener rod may be involved ( machining issues ). There is a sensitivity adjustment on the govener lever that could be related and lastly the pump itself....

I know of a few more mini Petteroids, that are poor runners but I never made tried top make a connection between the brand and the problems untill now. I wonder if Jack is running Ashmawegh and if the same or simmilar problems occured.

Next will be tracking the serial numbers if they are the same brand and trying to find out what engines are effected andf some dates of manufacture. Perhaps Joel can shed some light on this if would be willing share some numbers on sales and brake downs as well as any information regarding who esle may have been asking for parts and or venders selling these engines

[mactoollover2005]

Hi MK
        As they say a pic is worth a thousand words well your video clip is a gold ,ime of info. I watched you turn the eng over and everytime your hand came up to the top position the engine would clank,(injector firing) but sometimes it would spray a nice visible pattern next it would do nthing then half a spray and bounce around all over the spray patterns. this tell me that unless the govenor is throwing the fuel rack to full then no fuel witch is almost impossible at handcranking start up speed then the guilty culprit is..... the injector pump. should be able to get it fixed at a diesel shop or keep it for a door wedge.lol. of course this condition would also be a small culprit to have the engine try to bounce around

Derek

[mactoollover2005]

   I forgot to say why i thought it was the injectorr pump, im pretty sure its leaking past the internal pressure seals  and that is why the spray is all over the play and u have to go to fuul fuel rack to run it. but the only way to find out for sure is to tear it down.
Derek

[mkdutchman]

   I forgot to say why i thought it was the injectorr pump, im pretty sure its leaking past the internal pressure seals  and that is why the spray is all over the play and u have to go to fuul fuel rack to run it. but the only way to find out for sure is to tear it down.
Derek

Yes, putting in the new IP from Power Anand made a world of difference.

And in the meantime, maybe some day I'll get the check relapped, does anyone know where to get that done?

Just so no one gets confused, that video is of the original IP

[mactoollover2005]

Hi MK
       I dont own a gennie but i am working towards that goal but  u lost me in your reply
""And in the meantime, maybe some day I'll get the check relapped, does anyone know where to get that done?""
 Did u mean the fuel line check valve??

Derek

[mkdutchman]

Did u mean the fuel line check valve??

Derek

Yes, that's correct, it would be the check valve in the injector pump